Critics should pipe down, Rumsfeld says

Tours extended for reservists, Guard

BAGHDAD — Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Monday that terrorists may be gaining encouragement by some Americans' criticism of the Bush administration's actions in Iraq.

"We know for a fact ... that terrorists studied Somalia and they studied instances where the United States was dealt a blow and tucked in and persuaded themselves they could, in fact, cause us to acquiesce in whatever it is they wanted us to do," Rumsfeld told reporters as he flew back to Washington after a four-day tour of Iraq and Afghanistan.

"The United States is not going to do that. President Bush is not going to do that. Now, to the extent terrorists are given reason to believe he might, or if he is not willing to, the opponents might prevail in some way ... and they take heart in that, and that leads to more recruiting ... that leads to more encouragement, or that leads to more staying power. Obviously, that does make it more difficult."

Rumsfeld emphasized that Americans should feel free to criticize their government.

"There should be a debate and discussion on these things," he said. "We can live with that. We can live with a healthy debate as long as it is as elevated as possible, and as civil as possible."

His comments came as an oil pipeline fire cut off exports from northern Iraq for at least the next month, duty was extended for thousands of National Guard and reserve troops, and U.S. soldiers reacted to the president's call for $87 billion more to cover operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.

Monday was the seventh day in a row in which the U.S. military reported no combat deaths. But while the last week has been less violent for U.S. soldiers, problems continue for Iraq's infrastructure.

Pipelines targeted

Four oil pipelines from the city of Kirkuk were damaged by fires last week, including the export pipeline to Turkey, seen as a key revenue generator for reconstruction efforts in Iraq.

U.S. Army officials told Reuters that if no other breaks occurred, they hoped the export pipeline could begin operating again by late October.

The northern Iraqi oil field began exporting in mid-August, but the flow was shut down after two days when an explosion ripped through a different section of the pipeline.

Iraqi police, oil officials and coalition authorities were quick to blame sabotage. The flames were extinguished within days, but a larger fire broke out in another section of the pipeline, shutting off oil flow for weeks. Authorities said then that the pipeline may have fallen again to saboteurs--or may have just fallen apart.

The pipeline was poorly maintained under the regime of Saddam Hussein, and Army officials had reported that cracks had appeared in the first few hours of pumping.

The latest export pipeline fire is a setback for Washington at a time when Bush is appealing for stepped-up postwar funding. The $87 billion price tag, announced in a speech to the nation Sunday night, shocked some U.S. soldiers in Iraq.

"George knows he's having some problems," Sgt. Jayson Ronneberg of the 1st Armored Division said. "I think he's having problems on the home front and he's trying to justify why we're paying for all of Iraq's problems.

"We didn't cause 80 percent of the problems that people want us to fix now," he said. "But we're going to spend our money to keep all these people happy."

First Sgt. Cornell Grate, 37, of Anderson, S.C., welcomed the idea that the U.S. was conceding it needs more soldiers from other countries in Iraq.

"We need the UN involved. It backfired on [the administration]. We said we didn't need them, and guess what? We really need them," said Grate, whose unit has been patrolling Baghdad streets.

British officials announced Monday that they would send about 1,200 more soldiers to Iraq, and the Washington Post reported that the U.S. Army had decided to keep National Guard and reserve soldiers in Iraq longer than expected.

New order affects thousands

Defense Department officials have authority to activate Guard and reserve troops for two years, but most have been called up for only a year of total service, including training in the U.S. and debriefings once they returned home. The new order, requiring 12-month tours in Iraq or surrounding countries, means Guard and reserve troops could serve from one to six months longer than they expected.

There are 3,000 National Guard soldiers and 5,000 reservists in Iraq. An additional 5,000 Guard soldiers and 7,000 reservists are serving in Kuwait.

As the U.S. confronted postwar policy, critics of the decision to go to war received new ammunition Monday when the Associated Press revealed a confidential report by the UN nuclear agency about its inspections in Iraq before the war.

The report said International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors concluded that Iraq's nuclear program was in disarray and unlikely to be able to support the suspected weapons-building that the U.S. had cited as one reason to go to war.